Kildare Town Community School to operate at full capacity to meet demand

September 2020

Reporter:

Paula Campbell

27 Jan 2020

Email:

editor@kildarenow.ie

0

The Principal of Kildare Town Community School has confirmed that enrolment numbers for September 2020 has increased by 51 in order to serve the needs of the school catchment area

Principal John Hayes said an emergency board meeting was held on Monday night, January 20 to discuss the issue. He said that the school was built for a capacity of 1,000 students, adding that the new intake numbers will increase the total number of students to 990.

Parents were first alerted to the decision after a video was released on social media by local Cllr and Board member Suzanne Doyle. In the video, which has since been deleted, Cllr Doyle explains about the decision to increase the numbers and review the admissions policy and to address the anxiety for parents who were waiting to get a school place for their child.

This move was slammed as ‘election engineering’ by a spokesperson for the Parent’s Association who wished to remain anonymous as parents had not yet been informed of the increase at that time by the school. However Cllr Doyle said she used social media as the most expedient way to get the message across and denied any political engineering was involved.

The spokesperson added that the Association and parents are concerned that the school does not have the resources to take in the extra pupils adding that the library has to double up at times as a classroom and that pupils have lots of free classes.

A school statement said that new teachers will be recruited to deal with the intake increase.

It stated that due to the over-subscription and a sharp increase in enrolment for September 2020 the Board of Management of Kildare Town Community School held an Emergency Board Meeting on Monday night January 20,

"Enrolment was originally set at 180 students according to our Admissions Policy. Following last month’s Board of Management meeting (dated 6th December) this figure was increased to 205 students. This left a shortfall in our catchment area. At all times any parent/student within the catchment area who didn’t get a place in the first round of offers was kept informed by the school, the last correspondence dated last Thursday, January 15.

All members of the Board of Management of Kildare Town Community School continue to support our community and feeder schools. In order to serve our local families the board members raised the enrolment to 231 students at Monday night’s meeting.This decision to enrol a further 51 students, will bring our school to almost maximum capacity.”

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